Bridget Veltri
arts@mustangdaily.net
Volunteers will get their hands dirty in the name of sustainability at the Johnson Ranch open space this Saturday.
Organizations including the San Luis Obispo Parks and Recreation Department, Ranger Service Division and the Central Coast Concerned Mountain Bikers will work to construct sustainably-designed hiking, biking and horseback riding trails for Johnson Ranch, the city’s newest open space.
Eventually, Johnson Ranch will have 3 to 3 1/2 miles of multi-use trails and ultimately connect the property to the Irish Hills, another city open space, said Doug Carscaden, supervising park ranger for the City of San Luis Obispo.
“For open space to be available to the public it has to have trails otherwise there is nowhere for people to go,” he said.
“If everything goes right, these trails will hook up with the Irish Hills Nature Reserve,” Central Coast Concerned Mountain Bikers’ public relations and former Cal Poly gardener and alumni Frank Zika said. “It expands the opportunities for people to have a nature experience.”
Saturday’s trail work day will begin at 9 a.m. Carscaden said that there is more than a mile and a half of trail that is “flagged” and ready to be built.
CCMB will supply all the work tools needed and have several crew leaders supervising and instructing volunteers on techniques of safe trail building.
“I hope to see a lot of happy trail builders,” Zika said. “You move a lot of dirt, but it is in a very particular way, the design and installation are very sensitive to things like soil type, the contour of the land, vegetation types and erosion problems.”
Zika explained what it means for a trail to be sustainable.
“These trails are designed and will be installed to be sustainable, that means that if properly done, these trails will require little to no maintenance and will be there for our children’s children,” he said. “They are heritage trails that they are building and that is why there is so much care going into making them,” he said.
Carscaden, along with the city’s natural resource manager and the CCCMB designed the trails.
“The art and science of trail design is trying to show off the property while protecting its natural resources,” he said. “We try to lay the trails out so that they will be sustainable and easy to maintain.”
Zika said that CCCMB has been building trails for 20 years.
“We are not trying to bust out these trails as quickly as we can to get the park open, we are going to take our time and build them right the first time,” he said.
The city has more work days scheduled throughout next year to complete the trail system at Johnson Ranch.
The Johnson Ranch open space is located on South Higuera Road in San Luis Obispo.